Watertown Rower Brings Home 3 Medals from Club National Championships

Watertown's Joseph Piccirilli and his teammates on the Community Rowing Inc.’s Men’s under-23 team earned three medals at the 2011 USRowing Club Nationals meet in July.

Community Rowing Inc., located on Nonantum Road in Brighton, took the overall points trophy at the Club Nationals from Philadelphia’s Penn AC Rowing Association, which had taken the title the previous two years.

The competition, which brought together 1,500 rowers from 69 rowing clubs around the country, ran from July 13 to 17 at Eagle Creek Park in Indianapolis. Piccirilli, who graduated from Watertown High School in 2010, raced in the U23 Men’s Lightweight 4+, winning the silver medal; the U23 Men’s Lightweight 8+, winning the silver medal; and the Senior Men’s Lightweight 4+, winning the bronze medal.

The Lightweight 4+ boat included Peter Gibson (Belmont, Brown University); Piccirilli; Aaron Ladd (Cambridge, Princeton University); Max Mitrokostas, coxswain (West Barnstable, Boston College); and Christian Van Dyck (Wellesley, Dartmouth College).

Community Rowings Lightweight 8+ boat was rowed by Van Dyck; Scott Myslinski (Harvard, University of Pennsylvania); Ben Potash (Duxbury, MIT); Piccirilli; Lauri Kyötmaa (Belmont, Queen’s University); Ladd; Gibson; Ryan Fliss (Medway, The College of William and Mary); and coxswain Rose Wu (Belmont, University of
Michigan).

Lightweight 4+ boats have four rowers, all 160 lbs or under, and a coxswain. Lightweight 8+ boats have eight rowers, all 160 lbs or under, and a coxswain.

U23 teams include rowers under age 23, and are generally composed of college rowers competing outside of their college team during the summer.

Piccirilli rowed for Community Rowing Inc. during his junior and senior years in high school, during which time he was coached by Marko Vulkovic.

Last year, Piccirilli attended Syracuse University where he rowed for the freshman team. This fall he will begin attending Cornell University where he will major in government and row for the varsity lightweight team.